S.F. cops, merchants ready for revelers

SUPER BOWL XLVII

Updated 2:02 am, Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Ian Dunne, Susan Houlihan drink at Phoenix Bar on Valencia Street, which got off easy when vandals hit the Mission after the World Series.

Ian Dunne, Susan Houlihan drink at Phoenix Bar on Valencia Street, which got off easy when vandals hit the Mission after the World Series.

Photo: Sarah Rice, Special To The Chronicle

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Giovanna Sedillo, a manager at Harrington Galleries on Valencia Street, which was tagged with graffiti after the Giants' Series win, says she will be there Sunday night to protect the store.

Giovanna Sedillo, a manager at Harrington Galleries on Valencia Street, which was tagged with graffiti after the Giants' Series win, says she will be there Sunday night to protect the store.

Photo: Sarah Rice, Special To The Chronicle

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Angie Pasalis, a server at Southpaw on Mission Street, says she knows when patrons have had too much to drink.

Angie Pasalis, a server at Southpaw on Mission Street, says she knows when patrons have had too much to drink.

Photo: Sarah Rice, Special To The Chronicle

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Fans party in the Mission District after the 49ers win in Super Bowl XVI. Jan. 24, 1982.

Fans party in the Mission District after the 49ers win in Super Bowl XVI. Jan. 24, 1982.

Photo: John O'Hara, The Chronicle

S.F. cops, merchants ready for revelers

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In San Francisco's Mission District, they're hoping the Super Bowl is far more exciting than the Super Bowl aftermath.

That wasn't the case after the Giants completed their World Series sweep Oct. 28. Well into the night, drunken revelers smashed store windows, danced on cars, sprayed graffiti and set street fires fueled by mattresses and trash from businesses' garbage cans.

Firefighters couldn't douse the flames until police cleared away the people who were throwing bottles at them.

There were isolated problems elsewhere - including the trashing of a Muni bus at Third and Market streets - but most of the mayhem was in the Mission, where 24 of the night's 34 arrests were made. Eleven people ended up charged with felonies.

Police are promising it will be different Sunday night, and even merchants who were victimized in October are optimistic.

"Obviously it'll be insane, but our biggest issue is how we're going to fit everybody in here," said Tansy Grefsheim, a bartender at the Phoenix Bar on Valencia Street. "During the NFC Championship, we had people lined up outside, watching the game through the windows."

Good sign

The Phoenix got off lightly in October - its front was strewn with toilet paper. But the neighborhood was vandal-free when the 49ers beat the Atlanta Falcons on Jan. 20 to make the Super Bowl, which Grefsheim and others took as a good sign.

"We didn't hear a peep," said Giovanna Sedillo, a weekend manager of Valencia Street's Harrington Galleries, which had its storefront window defaced with graffiti after the Giants' win. "We were expecting something."

Police say the relatively placid reaction was due in large part to their placement of extra officers in areas known for drunken rowdiness. Just 12 people were arrested in the Mission, most for being drunk in public.

Fuel for the fires

Police Chief Greg Suhr said he's putting at least 100 extra officers on the streets Sunday night, many of them in the Mission. The city is making other changes as well, such as trying to minimize the available fuel for street fires.

"The World Series celebration happened to happen on garbage (pickup) night, which would explain why, for the first time ever, we saw fires," Suhr said.

The city couldn't change the trash pickup schedule, the chief said, because "nobody can predict when the clinch night is going to happen. But everybody knows Super Bowl Sunday is going to be on Sunday. We're working with (the Department of Public Works) to make sure all the trash is picked up before and during the game."

The city's trash collector, Recology, did early pickups on several commercial streets the night the 49ers beat the Falcons, company spokesman Robert Reed said. No fires were reported that evening.

Last call

The city is also trying to limit another type of riot fuel - booze. Suhr said police will enforce laws against drinking in public, and Mayor Ed Lee went a step further last week when he suggested that businesses limit their sales of hard alcohol after the game.

Some Mission District bartenders said there was no need for the request. "We definitely know to cut people off when they're starting to get into it," said Angie Pasalis, a server at Southpaw on Mission Street. "I usually tell them, 'You'll thank me in the morning.' "

Pasalis said she was "a little nervous" about Super Bowl Sunday, remembering the flames from the last time the city had something to celebrate. But she said she was also starting to "get wrapped up in the vibe" - the excitement of fans rooting for the home team's first Super Bowl in almost two decades.

James Fernandez is an employee of the furniture store Monument, which was just feet away from one of the Valencia Street bonfires in October. He said he planned to bunker at the store after the Super Bowl to make sure "people know we're here."

Hitting mom-and-pops

Vandals tried to throw something through the store's window after the Giants' victory, but didn't succeed in breaking it, Fernandez said.

Sedillo, the gallery weekend manager, said she also will be staying at her store after the Super Bowl, just in case. When she did so after the World Series, she stopped partyers from torching trash cans in front of her shop.

Sedillo said she and other gallery employees "pay it forward," and that has built goodwill in the community.

"We love the fans," Sedillo said. "We put out a good vibe. We're respectful of them and they're respectful of us."

Suhr noted that San Francisco has celebrated plenty of titles without trashing businesses and cars.

"We're a championship city," Suhr said. "To have two championships in one year, that's a problem I want to have every year."